All games favour certain types of strategy and all games have a house edge, an amount that goes to the casino for the running of the casino and with the aim of making a profit!

To determine you’re strategy you need to decide what you want from a game – do you want to enjoy regular small winnings and general entertainment, or do you want to get a buzz from placing bigger bets and seeing which way the cards, dice or slots fall?

Make sure you understand the pay table for the game you are playing; they can give you a good idea of what’s most unlikely to come up just based on the odds they offer for any particular combination. Use this information to your advantage when deciding how to play.

Essentially you should consider any spending at an online casino as money you are prepared to pay for the entertainment value of what you are doing. If you play for free then you get fantastic value, but if you play for real you get the buzz of the risk and potential reward, plus any entertainment value. Work out what matters to you and always play within your limits.

When it comes to choosing a game to play never play for real at a game until you know the basic rules, unless of course you want to throw your money away. Try free games first and get the hang of the game; use online advice sites to give you tips for how best to play a certain hand in a card game, for example, and never bet more than you can afford to lose. This is the biggest rule in gambling – consider any money you bet with already lost and if you win then it’s a bonus; don’t be tempted to dip into household funds or savings in the hope that the next gamble will be a winner – it’s a downward spiral and will cause you a lot of stress.